Ornamental beaded necklace



Aug. 2, 1955 G. R. 5. CHARLES ORNAMENTAL BEADED NECKLACE Filed Jah. 10,1955 IN VENTO R 11% A14. M11 a waE'rv all, M P

United States Patent i ORNAMENTAL BEADED NECKLACE Geoiifrey RussellStafford Charles, Marlow, England, as-

siguor, by mesne assignments, to Joseph H. Meyer Bros, Brooklyn, N. Y.,a corporation of New York Application January 10, 1955, Serial No.480,993 Claims priority, application Great Britain April 29, 1954 6Claims. (Cl. 41-10) This invention relates to ornamental beads andsimilar bodies and its object is to provide an improved means ofconnecting or linking such bodies together, for example, to make up astring of beads.

According to this invention, at least one of a pair of bodies which areto be joined together is formed of resilient material; one of the pairis provided with a neck carrying a head and the other is formed with asocket which is entered through a mouth of smaller cross-section thanthe socket interior, the head on one body and the mouth on the otherbeing so shaped and dimensioned in relation to one another that the headwill not ordinarily pass through the mouth but, due to the resilience ofsaid resilient material, can be forced through with a snap action whenit is desired to join two bodies together.

The invention is particularly applicable to the making up of a string ofbeads. Each bead may be provided with a head at one end and a socket atthe other so that a string can be made up by a number of such beads.

Preferably each of the bodies to be joined is moulded from syntheticplastic material such as polyethylene and may have the neck and headformed integrally with the main part of the body.

A string of beads or bead members may be formed of beads of differentdimensions, the connecting beads and sockets being graded in size, eachhead being arranged to fit into a socket on the same size bead and intoa socket of the next larger and/ or the next smaller size. The number ofsizes of heads and sockets need not be the same as the number of sizesof beads and it may be found, for example, that two or three sizes ofsockets would be suflicient for a necklace of graded beads. However, itwill be appreciated that, when possible, the heads and sockets are mostconveniently all of the same size.

In an alternative arrangement of beads of the kind described are formedas a set of beads of different dimensions, the connecting heads may bearranged to fit only into correspondingly sized sockets and specialjunction beads may be provided with heads and sockets ofnoncorresponding sizes. By this arrangement a graded necklace may bebuilt up with a number or" sets of beads, possibly of graded sizes,having the same size heads and sockets and with the various sets ofbeads joined by the special junction beads.

According to a further feature of the present invention each bead may beformed of a number of parts which are joined together, for example, bybeing made in the form of two halves of a hemisphere which aresubsequently joined. This construction has the advantage that it enableshollow beads to be made, which is particularly advantageous for largersize beads since it saves material and enables a light-weight head to bemade. This form of construction furthermore provides one means of makingmulti-coloured beads since the various parts of the bead may be made ofdiflerent coloured materials.

The two halves of a bead formed as two hollow hemispheres may be made tojoin together with a snap action, for example by forming one hemispherewith a portion,

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around the mouth, of reduced external diameter so as to fit inside themouth of the other hemisphere. The two engaging hemispheres may beresiliently locked by forming a number of recesses or a circumferentialgroove on one of the mating surfaces and corresponding projections or acircumferential ridge on the other.

Another method of making multi-coloured beads is by using a doublemoulding process. In such a process the first mould may be arranged toproduce a bead having a number of recesses or grooves which are filledin the second moulding stage. Alternatively, the first moulding stagemay be arranged to produce a series of shaped areas, for examplestar-shaped areas positioned to lie on the outer surface of the mouldfor the final moulding and so appearing on the outer surface of thebead.

Another form of inulti-coloured appearance may be made by puttingplastic material of two or more diilerent colours in the mould in suchmanner that it is not mixed homogeneously thereby obtaining a streaky ormottled appearance on the surface of the beads.

The method or" joining beads or similar bodies described above isapplicable to pendant ornaments such as earrings. For some suchornaments it may be desirable to provide beads with more than one socketwhereby two or more pendant beads or like bodies may be attached to onebead.

For use in a string of beads, it may be convenient to mould a pluralityof beads together as a unit, the beads being joined by a flexible neck.Such a unit would be provided with a neck and head at one end and asocket at the other end so that a series of such units can be joinedtogether or joined to individual beads to form a necklace or the like.

A particular feature of the construction of beads described above isthat it permits of considerable flexibility in the junction between thebeads. This flexibility may be obtained either by flexibility of theneck or by the freedom of play of the neck in the socket of the nextbead. Preferably the socket is formed with a conical or similar openingto permit angular movement of adjacent beads without the necessity offlexing the neck. It may be found desirable in some cases to taper theneck in order to permit greater freedom of movement. Such taper need notnecessarily be a straight taper. it will be appreciated also that theuse of a long neck will increase the flexibility of a necklace formedfrom such beads.

it will be understood that modifications of the above construction arepossible without departing from the scope of the invention. For example,instead of having a socket on one side and stem on the other, each beadmay be formed with two sockets, the beads being con nected together bymeans of separate double-headed stems or link pieces. Furthermore, theinvention has applications other than to ornamental beads; a modifiedform of this construction may be employed in the production of modelsused to illustrate molecular structures.

The following is a description of a number of embodiments of theinvention, reference being made to the accompanying drawings in which:

Figures 1 and 2 are respectively a side elevation and a sectionalelevation of a bead constructed according to the invention;

Figure 3 is a cross-section showing, number of beads of the kind and 2;

Figure 4 is a cross-section through a number of beads of an alternativeconstruction;

Figure 5 is a cross-section through yet .a further construction of head;

Figure 6 is a cross-section illustrating a bead adapted to receive apendant ornament;

Figure 7 illustrates a construction of necklace in which joinedtogether, a illustrated in Figures 1 Patented Aug. 2, 1955 individualbead members have a number of bead elements moulded integrally together,and

Figure 8 is a cross-section of a modified form of the bead of Figures 1and 2.

Referring to Figures 1 to 3, there is shown a construction of beadnecklace in which each bead is formed as a solid substantially sphericalbody 10 having projecting radially therefrom a short and comparativelythin neck 11 carrying a substantially spherical head 12. Diametricallyopposite the head 12 is a socket 13 which is entered by way of a mouth14 of slightly smaller diameter than the head 12 of another head whichis to be received in the socket. The mouth is slightly below the surfaceof the main part of the body 10 and is entered by way of a tapered entrypassage 15. These beads are made by moulding resilient plastic material,such as polyethylene. The resilience of the material permits of the head12 on one bead being forced through the mouth 14 into the socket 13 ofanother bead. The socket is made amply large enough to accommodate thehead 12. The head can thus move in the socket. Since also there isprovided the tapered entry passage 15, the construction allows angularmovement between the beads so as to provide the requisite flexibility ofa string of such beads. It will be seen that the beads can be strungtogether without the need of any conventional thread or cord and that,moreover, the conventional clasp for fastening a necklace can also bedispensed with if desired. A necklace may be made up of a number ofidentical beads but, as shown in Figure 3, the beads may be graded insize. Preferably all the heads and sockets are made of the same size butin a graded necklace it may be necessary on the smaller beads to havesmaller heads and sockets. In such a case, the connecting heads andsockets may be graded in size so that each head will fit into a socketon the same size bead and into a socket of the next larger or nextsmaller size. Alternatively, the connecting heads may be arranged onlyto fit into correspondingly sized sockets and special junction beadsprovided with heads and sockets of non-corresponding sizes.

The heads may be made spherical as described above or may beconico-spherical in shape, that is to say, the head is formed of ahemisphere which at its diametral plane is joined to a circular cone,the conical part of the head being arranged with its apex directedoutwardly facilitating the assembly of the beads. In this latter case,the socket mouth may conveniently be made circular with a diameter lessthan that of the major axis of the head.

Figure 4 illustrates an alternative construction in which each bead isprovided with two sockets 21, 22. The beads are joined by connectinglinks each formed by a stem 23 having heads 24, 25 at the two endsthereof. It will be readily apparent that it would also be possible touse the beads 20 with beads having two heads projecting fromdiametrically-opposite points.

For large beads it may be preferable to construct the bead as a hollowmember in order to save material and enable the bead to be of lighterweight. Such a hollow bead may be constructed as shown in Figure 5 inwhich the bead is formed of two separate moulded parts 31, 32 each ofsubstantially hemispherical form. The part 32 is shown as having aninwardly-directed flange 33 which engages a recess 34 formed on the part31. The resilience of the material permits the two halves to be joinedtogether with a snap action. It will be appreciated that the flange 33may not extend completely around the mouth of the hemisphere and mightconsist only of a number of projecting lugs which engage correspondingrecesses in the part 31. The parts 31 and 32 are formed one with a head35 and the other with a socket 36 for connection to similar beads as inthe previously described embodiments. For convenience of moulding, inthe two-part bead of Figure 5, the socket is formed by a short passagewhich tapers inwardly from both ends to have a throat through which abead is forced to pass into the hollow interior of the bead. it will beappreciated that hollow beads similar to Figure 5 might be made 7 ofmore than two parts and also that the various parts may be made ofdifferent colours to form multi-coloured beads.

As shown in Figure 6, a bead 40 may be provided with a plurality ofheads and/or sockets, for example two sockets 41, 42 and a head 43 sothat it may be joined to three other bodies. Such ahead will permit of apendant ornament being fixed on to a necklace or the like. It will, ofcourse, be appreciated that the heads and/ or sockets may be formed inany selected positions.

As shown in Figure 7, a number of beads 44 may be formed as an integralunit joined by necks 45. Such an arrangement may facilitate theconstruction and assembly of a necklace by reducing the number of unitsrequired to be joined together. Each group of beads may be provided witha head 46 at one end and a socket 47 at the other.

Figure 8 is a cross-section of a modified form of the bead of Figures 1and 2. In Figure 8, the socket is formed by a cylindrical cavity 50having a throat 51 formed by an inwardly-directed flange 52.

I claim:

1. In a stringless necklace, a chain comprising a plurality of at leastfour bead members formed of resilient synthetic plastic material havingthe resilient properties of polyethylene, each pair of adjacent beadmembers being connected to each other by a ball and socket joint, 21first of each pair of said adjacent bead members having an extension inthe form of a neck extending from a surface thereof facing the otheradjacent bead member, said neck having a head adjacent the outer endthereof, the facing surface of said other adjacent bead member having asocket opening for detachably receiving and retaining the head of thefirst bead member, said socket opening including a mouth which is ofsmaller cross sectional area than the interior portion of said socketopening, said head being larger in cross sectional area than the mouthof said socket opening whereby such head will not ordinarily passthrough the mouth of a socket opening but due to the resilience of saidplastic material may be forced therethrough with a snap action toprovide a relatively secure but easily disconnected junction betweenadjacent beads, said head being smaller than the interior portion ofsaid socket opening and the neck on said bead member in the regionadjacent the head being smaller in cross sectional area than said mouthwhereby to provide for freedom of play of the neck in the socket openingand flexibility in the junction between each pair of adjacent beadmembers.

2. In a stringless necklace, a chain comprising a plurality of at leastfour bead members formed of resilient synthetic plastic material havingthe resilient properties of polyethylene, each pair of adjacent beadmembers being connected to each other by a ball and socket joint, afirst of each pair of said adjacent bead members having an extension inthe form of a neck extending from a surface thereof facing the otheradjacent bead member, said neck having a head adjacent the outer endthereof, the facing surface of said other adjacent bead member having asocket opening for detachably receiving and retaining the head of thefirst bead member, said socket opening including a month which is ofsmaller cross-sectional area than the interior portion of said socketopening, said head being larger in cross sectional area than the mouthof said socket opening whereby such head will not ordinarily passthrough the mouth of a socket opening but due to the resilience of saidplastic material may be forced therethrough with a snap action toprovide a relatively secure but easily disconnected junction betweenadjacent beads, said head being smaller than the interior portion ofsaid socket opening and the neck on said bead member in the regionadjacent the head being smaller in cross sectional area than said mouthwhereby to provide for freedom of play of the neck in the socket openingand flexibility in the junction between each pair of adjacent beadmembers the said mouth being spaced inwardly of the ex ternal surface ofsaid other head member and being connected to said external surface byan inwardly converging passage to facilitate assembly of the beadmembers.

3..In a stringless necklace, a chain comprising a plurality of at leastfour bead members formed of resilient synthetic plastic material havingthe resilient properties of polyethylene, each pair of adjacent beadmembers being connected to each other by a ball and socket joint, afirst of each pair of said adjacent bead members having an extension inthe form of a neck extending from a surface thereof facing the otheradjacent bead member, said neck having a head adjacent the outer endthereof, the facing surface of said other adjacent bead member having asocket opening for detachably receiving and retaining the head of thefirst bead member, said socket opening including a mouth which is ofsmaller crosssectional area than the interior portion of said socketopening, said head being larger in cross sectional area than the mouthof said socket opening whereby such head will not ordinarily passthrough the mouth of socket opening but due to the resilience of saidplastic material may be forced therethrough with a snap action toprovide a relatively secure but easily disconnected junction betweenadjacent beads, said head being smaller than the interior portion ofsaid socket opening and the neck on said head member in the regionadjacent the head being smaller in cross sectional area than said mouthwhereby to provide for freedom of play of the neck in the socket openingand flexibility in the junction between each pair of adjacent beadmembers said beads being formed of polyethylene.

4. In a stringless necklace, a chain comprising a plurality of at leastfour bead members formed of resilient synthetic plastic material havingthe resilient properties of polyethylene, each pair of adjacent beadmembers being connected to each other by a ball and socket joint, afirst of each pair of said adjacent bead members having an extension inthe form of a neck extending from a surface thereof facing the otheradjacent bead member, said neck having a head adjacent the outer endthereof, the facing surface of said other adjacent bead member having asocket opening for detachably receiving and retaining the head of thefirst bead member, said socket opening including a mouth which is ofsmaller crosssectional area than the interior portion of said socketopening, said head being larger in cross sectional area than the mouthof said socket opening whereby such head will not ordinarily passthrough the mouth of a socket opening but due to the resilience of saidplastic material may be forced therethrough with a snap action toprovide a relatively secure but easily disconnected junction betweenadjacent beads, said head being smaller than the interior portion ofsaid socket opening and the neck on said head member in the regionadjacent the head being smaller in cross sectional area than said mouthwhereby to provide for freedom of play of the neck in the socket openingand flexibility in the junction between each pair of adjacent beadmembers at least one of the bead members having at least two socketopenings therein.

5. In a stringless necklace, a chain comprising a phrrality of at leastfour bead members formed of resilient synthetic plastic material havingthe resilient properties of polyethylene, each pair of adjacent beadmembers being connected to each other by a ball and socket joint, afirst of each pair of said adjacent bead members having an extension inthe form of a neck extending from a surface thereof facing the otheradjacent bead member, said neck having a head adjacent the outer endthereof,

the facing surface of said other adjacent bead member having a socketopening for detachably receiving and retaining the head of the firstbead member, said socket opening including a month which is of smallercrosssectional area than the interior portion of said socket opening,said head being larger in cross sectional area than the mouth of saidsocket opening whereby such head will not ordinarily pass through themouth of a socket opening but due to the resilience of said plasticmaterial may be forced therethrough with a snap action to provide arelatively secure but easily disconnected junction between adjacentbeads, said head being smaller than the interior portion of said socketopening and the neck on said bead member in the region adjacent the headbeing smaller in cross sectional area than said mouth whereby to providefor freedom of play of the neck in the socket opening and flexibility inthe junction between each pair of adjacent bead members at least one ofsaid bead members comprising a plurality of head elements integrallyconnected to each other, the opposite ends of the last mentioned onebead member being connected to adjacent bead members by said ball andsocket joints.

6. In a stringless necklace, a chain comprising a plurality of at leastfour bead members formed of resilient 7 synthetic plastic materialhaving the resilient properties of polyethylene, each pair of adjacentbead members being connected to each other by a ball and socket joint, afirst of each pair of said adjacent bead members having an extension inthe form of a neck extending from a surface thereof facing the otheradjacent bead member, said neck having a head adjacent the outer endthereof, the facing surface of said other adjacent bead member having asocket opening for detachably receiving and retaining the head of thefirst bead member, said socket opening including a mouth which is ofsmaller crosssectional area than the interior portion of said socketopening, said head being larger in cross sectional area than the mouthof said socket opening whereby such head will not ordinarily passthrough the mouth of a socket opening but due to the resilience of saidplastic material may be forced therethrough with a snap action toprovide a relatively secure but easily disconnected junction betweenadjacent beads, said head being smaller than the interior portion ofsaid socket opening and the neck on said bead member in the regionadjacent the head being smaller in cross sectional area than said mouthwhereby to provide for freedom of play of the neck in the socket openingand flexibility in the junction between each pair of adjacent beadmembers said bead members are made of polyethylene, the heads of saidextensions being of generally spherical form, the said mouths of saidsocket openings being spaced inwardly from the external surface of thebead member and being connected to said external surface by an inwardlyconverging passage to facilitate assembly of the beads.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS1,468,612 Johnson et a1 Sept. 18, 1923 1,797,968 Sweeney Mar. 24, 19312,582,553 McMurtrie Jan. 15, 1952 2,656,578 Tworek Oct. 27, 19532,662,335 Calverley Dec. 15, 1953 2,688,202 ONeill Sept. 7, 1954 FOREIGNPATENTS 520,027 Germany Aug. 9, 1929 216,671 Great Britain June 5, 1924490,470 Great Britain Aug. 15, 1938 597,762 Great Britain Feb. 3, 1948625,357 Great Britain June 27, 1949 676,144 Great Britain July 23, 1952

